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"Just because you do not take an interest in politics doesn't mean politics won't take an interest in you” Pericles

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Besides revealing how cool he is, President Obama’s public release of his NCAA “Baracket” selections on ESPN yesterday got me to thinking. How many of the teams reside in Democratic House districts? How many are located in districts that voted for Obama? The sportscasters can debate the primacy of the Big East (did they really deserve three Number One seeds) over the ACC and the down years for the SEC, Pac 10 and Big Ten. That ground has been covered. If we look at the bracket through the lens of the Red/Blue divide that permeates our political discussions (I know, I know, this isn’t the post partisan change Obama promised, but just let me have my fun here, OK?) how does the tournament stack up? And, did the president calculate the political ramifications in making his selections?First, a few observations about the President’s Baracket. Despite the punditocracy’s growing chorus about the president’s aggressive agenda, the president’s bracket is extremely conservative. Pragmatically embracing the status quo, the Commander-in-Chief has four top seeds (UNC, Pitt & Louisville) and one # 2 (Memphis) reaching the Final Four in Detroit. In fact, he’s only got the lower seed winning NINE games (out of 63!) in the entire tournament. In the first round, he’s got two # 11s (Temple and VCU) and a #10 (Maryland) knocking off higher seeds along two #9s (Butler & Tennessee) emerging with victories over #8s. He's got an entire Region (the Midwest) playing to form with every game won by the top seed. There is no Cinderella in his bracket.

Forty-four of the sixty-five teams are represented by Democrats in the House. Regionally, the partisan breakdown looks like this:

The East (Boston) and Midwest (Indianapolis) are the bluest regions with the South (Memphis) the reddest. The Midwest Region has the most “purple” districts, purple being defined as a district that gave its vote to a house candidate that was from the opposite party of the district’s winning presidential candidate. Of the nine swing districts only one (Michigan State’s 8th) was won by Obama yet held by a Republican.

Obama’s 44 schools represents 67% of the field, far outpacing the 53% of the popular vote he won in November and exceeding the 59% of House districts the Democrats currently control. This might reflect the presence if many urban schools in this year’s tournament. Or, it could it be validation that America’s colleges and universities are brainwashing our nation’s youth with liberal ideology? I prefer to think it merely represents Beck’s Epic Failure to surround us.

Its clear Obama isn’t picking based on a state’s battleground status, as he’s most often taking the ‘safer’ choice by selecting the higher seed. Wonder if he’ll venture to make his bracket public during the 2012 tournament when he’s gearing up for reelection? As Obama’s picks move into later rounds, his Blue to Red ratio remains constant until the Elite Eight, when only Michigan State remains from a Republican-held district. But, keep in mind, Obama did win this district last fall.

Among the Democrats, the Blue Dogs find themselves outflanked by the Progressive Caucus. Three Blue Dogs are represented in the tournament (Utah’s Jim Matheson, Kansas’ Dennis Moore and FSU’s Allen Boyd). The Progressive Caucus, on the other hand, has lots of teams in the Big Dance: Arizona, California, UCLA, USC, Butler, BC, Morgan St, Minnesota, Wake Forest, Cornell, Binghamton, Cleveland State, Temple, Memphis, Washington and Wisconsin all play in districts represented by members of the Progressive Caucus.

Other fun Partisan Big Dance factoids:Only two districts are represented by two teams in this year’s tournament:

Thirty-two states (and the District of Columbia) are represented in the field of 65. Seventeen states (AZ, CA, IN, KY, MD, MI, NC, NY, OH, OK, PA, TN, TX, UT, VA, WA and WI) are represented by more than one team. California, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Tennessee lead the way with four teams each in the tourney. Of these 32 states, Obama won 18 (representing 302 electoral votes- including DC) to McCain’s 13 (127 EVs)

The most populous state without a home team to root for is Georgia. Conversely, the smallest state sending a team this year is North Dakota.

The only state (aside from DC and North Dakota) to have all of its districts represented is Utah.

If you’ve gotten this far, thanks for indulging me two of my passions – March Madness and political minutiae. Totally pointless, I know, but a wonderful diversion from economic meltdowns, Wall Street Ponzi schemes and Octo-Mom.

With campaign 2008 still not resolved in Minnesota, the politicos are already revving up for Election Day 2010. Can the Democrats break through and win a filibuster-breaking 60 Senate seats? The bigger question is, “Do they really want to?”

They could break the threshold by enticing Arlen Specter to abandon the dwindling herd of Irrelephants in the Senate. As we debate the possibility, the wingnuts at Human Events provide their hunting list of RINO Senators. You know it’s bad when Utah’s Bob Bennett and Mississippi’s Thad Cochran make their top ten.

As Senate majority leader, he juggles a myriad of competing political interests. He also has to balance those against his own best interest as he gears up for a potentially tough re-election battle in 2010.

Lately, the Nevada Democrat has been putting some daylight between his positions and President Obama’s. It’s a strategy that might help him avoid the fate of Tom Daschle, who was defeated for re-election in South Dakota in 2004 despite being the Senate’s top Democrat.

Reid, 69, recently has made a point of saying he’s working withObama, not for him.

Right. Nevada’s voters backed President Obama last fall and kicked out one of their two Republican house members. The incumbent Republican governor is one of the least popular in the nation and the administration has moved to abandon Yucca Mountain, removing Nevada politics’ most radioactive issue and Harry Reid is afraid of running as part of the President’s team?

The analogy to Tom Daschle who ran in a Deep Red state against a very popular president riding the post-9/11 Terror Train is intellectually lame. If Reid is indeed frightened of the specter of Daschle’s defeat, Democrats should be worried about the quality of our Senate leadership.

Change I Can Believe In:· Breaking the stalemate: Pat Leahy threatens to name names.· Restoring the Constitution: Confounding Republicans, Democrats show they understand the Founding Principle of the three co-equal branches of government. After years of rubberstamping Dubya's policies, GOPers are perplexed by congressional Democrats fulfilling their Constitutional role.